Live news about the coronavirus: Canada has secured about 10 doses of vaccine per person; US deaths exceed 450,000 | World news

The United States, the world’s most affected country in terms of both the number of coronavirus cases and the number of people killed by the pandemic, has exceeded the death toll by 450,000, according to Johns Hopkins University, as it approaches. half astonishing. a million lives lost.

The Biden administration has warned that the US toll could rise to 600,000 before the virus is brought under control.

Canada has a right to receive shots under the Covax plan, which uses advance purchases from rich nations to ensure vaccine development and subsidize doses for the poorest countries. It has contributed about $ 345 million, half of which paid for its own doses.

But global health authorities have criticized countries for doing private business, of which Canada has done enough to secure 9.6 doses per person, which they say raise vaccine prices and represent a form of “double immersion.” , taking Covax supplies while they are at the same time, signing private agreements that make it difficult to install doses that would be shared equitably.

Other countries that have reserved significant supplies through parallel agreements with pharmaceutical companies, including Australia, Israel and the United Kingdom, did not choose to receive or were not assigned any vaccines from the first batch of allocations announced on Wednesday.

Learn more about this report from The Guardian Michael Safi and Leyland Cecco:

Canada will need to receive a significant amount of vaccines in the coming months through a platform designed to maximize supply to poor countries, according to a new forecast, despite reserving the largest number of doses per person in the world through direct treatments. with pharmaceutical companies.

Chile and New Zealand, which have also made controversial secondary agreements to secure their own supply of vaccines, will also receive a higher-than-average number of doses, according to the provisional allocation schedule released Wednesday by Covax.

Covax, a mechanism for distributing doses of Covid-19 equitably worldwide, aims to administer doses of 330 million Oxford / AstraZeneca and Pfizer / BioNTech vaccines to 145 countries through June, volumes that, according to , will be enough to cover an average of 3.3% of the population of each country.

Ottawa has led the world in direct deals with pharmaceutical companies to secure its own supply, reserving enough to cover approximately 9.6 doses per person, according to the Guardian analysis.

Michael Safi and Leyland Cecco of The Guardian report:

Hello and welcome to today’s live coronavirus coverage with me, Helen Sullivan.

As always, you can find me on Twitter @helenrsullivan.

Canada will need to receive a significant amount of vaccines in the coming months through a platform designed to maximize supply to poor countries, according to a new forecast, despite reserving the largest number of doses per person in the world through direct treatments. with pharmaceutical companies.

The Globe and Mail reports that Canada will be the only G7 country in the world to accept vaccines from the program.

My colleagues Michael Safi and Leyland Cecco report that Canada has a right to be shot under the Covax scheme, which uses advance purchases from rich nations to subscribe to vaccine development and subsidize doses for the poorest countries. .

But Ottawa has also led the world in direct deals with pharmaceutical companies to secure its own supply, reserving enough to cover about 9.6 doses per person, according to the Guardian analysis.

More information coming soon. For now, here are the other key recent developments:

• Regulators in Belgium are the last in Europe to discourage the administration of the Oxford / AstraZeneca vaccine to the elderly due to the lack of data on its effectiveness.
• Switzerland has withheld approval of the Covid Oxford / AstraZeneca vaccine, said his drug regulator today.
• European leaders recklessly endanger the health of their own public by using self-service scores to attack the launch of the coronavirus vaccine in Britain, UK health experts have warned. “The views of politicians in Europe contrast with the scientific view of the European regulator,” said a former head of the drug regulator.
• New coronavirus infections in Greece increased by more than 1,000 for the second day in a row, with health authorities totaling 1,151 in the country’s account after a month of the three-digit daily figure.
• Veterinarians in Germany have trained blond dogs to detect coronavirus in human saliva samples with 94% accuracy.
• The Covax installation scheme aims to distribute at least 330 m of dose during the first half of 2021, their co-directors announced Wednesday. It has also reached an agreement with the Serum Institute of India for doses of up to 1.1 billion vaccines from AstraZeneca and Novavax for $ 3 per dose for low- and middle-income countries.
• AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford intend to develop a new generation vaccine to address new variants already in the autumn, a senior executive at the manufacturer told Reuters.